Critical Conversations for Social Work

Disclaimer: This episode contains mentions of substances, sexual assault and sexual violence, and the mention of death of a young person. Please listen at your own discretion. In this, our final episode of the series, crew members Sia and Jean unpack the previous episode with Brooke and Chen Li about creative practice in the AOD space. Sia shares valuable insights into social policy directions in...

Disclaimer: This episode contains mentions of drugs and other substances, and the mention of death of a young person. Please listen at your own discretion. Your mental health matters. Note: The drug diversion program starts in 2024 when Brooke mentioned "next year" as we recorded this episode at the end of 2023 In this episode, Chen Li sits down and chats with Brooke about creative pract...

Disclaimer: This episode discusses people’s perspectives of their lived experiences with cancer. This is a sensitive topic, please listen at your discretion .  Transcript: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Z3UqU6KPU3rt5-u6kfpMeS7JtDSt05ap/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=100719681595597138502&rtpof=true&sd=true In this episode, Jean chats with Ari to further unpack creative practice in supporti...

Disclaimer: This episode discusses people’s perspectives of their lived experiences with cancer. This is a sensitive topic, please listen at your discretion.  Transcript: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1p3PDg14mvtkZZ--YYP40lK9n2UpsXUmX/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=100719681595597138502&rtpof=true&sd=true In this episode, Aliona and Sally, two passionate social work students and cancer sur...

Disclaimer: This episode will contain mentions of mental health and trauma, suicide and suicidal ideation, and institutional abuse. Listener discretion is advised. In this episode, Jean and Moira talk about men’s mental health, toxic masculinity, and the challenges within the NDIS scheme. Moira shares her perspectives on how societal expectations oppress men and how these contribute to issues like...

In this episode, our crew member Tilly engages in an insightful conversation with Simon, a private practitioner in the NDIS and mental health space and the founder of Mindfulness Men. Simon calls himself a lived experience therapist and generously shares his journey of navigating mental health challenges. Tilly and Simon talk about how society constructions of masculinity impact men’s mental healt...

In this special feature follow-up episode, our crew member Nate speaks with Tamara and Mai from Students Against Placement Poverty (SAPP) Queensland branch. They discuss the growing concern and movement forward in the efforts to secure paid placement for students in social work and human service degrees and other helping professions. The activist group members speak about the vision and goals of S...

Disclaimer: This episode discusses difficult topics related to domestic and family violence, rape and sexual assault, mental health and trauma. Listener discretion is advised. Jean and special guest, Abby unpack some of the concepts, practices and discourses explored in the episode with Jules and Ari. They explore the role of patriarchy in the perpetuation of policing and surveillance of victims/s...

Disclaimer: This episode discusses difficult topics related to mental health and trauma, suicidal ideation, and institutional abuse. Listener discretion is advised. Jean and special guest Abby explore a portion of the conversation with Jules that had been excluded from the main episode in order to allow for a broader and more direct response. Jean touches on the ways in which women are tasked with...

Disclaimer: This episode discusses difficult topics related to domestic and family violence, mental health, rape and sexual assault, and suicidal ideation. Listener discretion is advised. In this episode, podcast crew member Aarrah speaks with Jules Thompson, founder of Broken Ballerina and lived experience worker and survivor of domestic violence. Jules speaks passionately, recognising the entren...

Social Work honours student Matt assists Jean in deconstructing the previous Part A episode with Jo, Chris, and Demi. Matt speaks about his honours research and lived experience of navigating the family court system and critically reflecting on ways to build parental agency in the legal system. Matt and Jean unpack the ways creative alternatives such as restorative practices can be utilised as a m...

Crew member Demi, and special guests Jo and Chris engaged in an insightful discussion about the concepts of mediation, restorative justice, restorative engagement and how they tie into restorative practices within a social work and human services context. Jo and Chris touch on how they bring creative ideas and concepts to restorative engagement as an alternative to more dominant approaches within...

Today, Jean and her good friend/colleague Charleen unpack the part A episode that features Natalie, an incredible social worker working with people over the age of 65 in the mental health sector, and our podcast crew member Juliette. Charleen is a Cook Islander and Maori woman working for a non-profit community health organisation. She brings many aspects of creativity to her work through story-te...

Disclaimer: This episode contains mentions of suicide and suicidal ideation. Listener discretion is advised. In this episode, our podcast crew member Juliette and Natalie, a mental health social worker, discuss the various obstacles that social workers face working within a hospital mental health setting. Natalie speaks about her critical and creative practices in a range of settings and most rece...

Disclaimer: This episode discusses difficult topics related to racism, suicide, themes of displacement, and domestic and family violence. Listener discretion is advised. Crew members Ruth and Jean unpack the previous episode whereby Laila and Deepa explore the challenges and creative practices used when working with people seeking asylum. They discuss the impacts of dominant social forces, such as...

Disclaimer: This episode discusses difficult topics related to racism, suicide, themes of displacement, and domestic and family violence. Listener discretion is advised. In this episode, podcast crew member Laila interviews Deepa, a social worker at the Romero Center. They dive ‘Deepa’ into working alongside people seeking asylum, and the complexities that come with this work. Deepa shares her per...

In this episode, podcast crew member Jean Carruthers interviews social work Professors Christine Morley and Linda Briskman and student advocate and co-founder of Students Against Placement Poverty Isaac Wattenberg. They unpack the prolific issue of student poverty instigated by mandatory placements as part of completing a social work and human services university degree. Isaac adds weight to the d...

Jean and QUT student Jane discuss the previous conversation between Peter Westoby and Teddy around critical pedagogy in Community Development. Jane and Jean unpack some of the concepts from Friere’s pedagogy and how these have been linked to community development practices. The role of critical and creative pedagogy and how to practise critical reflection, reflexivity and questioning our assumptio...

In this episode, Peter Westoby, a passionate community development worker and former educator at QUT with a career spanning 22 years introduces crew member Teddy to the creative ways Paulo Freire’s critical pedagogy has supported him in his community development and education practice. Among other insightful ideas, highlighted is his use of Freire’s concept of codification and the need for love an...

Former student Madison helps Jean to unpack the previous episode with Heather and Georgia. Equally as passionate, Maddy shares from her perspective the structural and systemic challenges for non-human species in our anthropocentric society. Recognition of the exploitation of non-human animals as a social injustice and ways we could do things differently without much effort are explored. Madison’s...

This episode features Associate Professor Heather Fraser, educator and course coordinator at QUT and crew member Georgia. In the episode, Heather speaks passionately with Georgia about her research and pedagogy in the area of critical animal studies and green social work and how this has shaped her social work practice and everyday life. This discussion acknowledges the role of social work to prot...

Jean holds space for a conversation with former QUT student Peter and crew member Izzy to unpack the previous episode with Jen and Angela. Izzy and Peter generously share their experience of working in queer spaces in their field placement and practice from their lived perspective. In the discussion a conversation about how to bring queer theory into social work and human service practice by chall...

Jen Kaighin, a queer educator at QUT, joins crew member Angela to discuss how queer theory supports her education practice.  Jen talks about her experience as a practitioner in the human services field working with young people. Jen discusses how queer theory helped her to make critical links between theory and practice in her role as a practitioner. Jen speaks to the importance of queer theory in...

In this episode, former student at QUT Lauren Mickle is speaking to Jean about the complexities of housing and homelessness with a focus on her research on boarding houses in Brisbane region in the late 80’s, based on her article “An Olympic feat: Securing boarding house tenancies in Brisbane''. Their discussions touch on the gentrification of suburbs across Brisbane city. Jean and Lauren...

In this episode, Angela interviews Shane Warren, a lecturer at QUT about the activist pedagogy he uses when working with marginalised peoples across a variety of practice areas.  Shane expresses his passion for critical and anti-oppressive practices and exposes the structural inequalities and dehumanising stereotypes prevalent within the homelessness space. Angela and Shane touch on the lack of fu...